In the construction heretofore built of this type, the Raidel U.S. Pat. No. 3,801,086 represents one in which a special hanger mounting is provided for attachment to the vehicle frame, to accommodate the bushing attaching the end of the torque beam to the vehicle. It is an object of the present invention to design the torque beam so that it can be attached directly to a frame of the vehicle, such as could be found in a drop frame trailer.
In the prior art there has been a resilient bushing connecting the torque beam to the hanger and that bushing had its outer cylinder connected to or forming a part of the torque beam itself. In the present invention, that outer cylinder of the resilient bushing is permanently welded to the frame of the vehicle. In the former structure, the hanger bracket came down in two sections on the opposite ends of the bushing. In the present arrangement, there is a single primary connection in the form of the attachment of the outer cylindrical sleeve of the bushing to the web of the frame of the vehicle, and two arms of the torque beam are connected to the pivot of the bushing at opposite ends of the pivot and are non-rotatably secured thereto. These two ends of the torque beam in the present disclosure thus are separated so as to straddle the flange on the frame of the vehicle, but they are then tapered toward each other so that they can fit between the two side arms of the lower or buffer beam. An object of the invention is a suspension of the foregoing type that can accommodate differences in elevation between opposite ends of the axle. Another object is a suspension having the foregoing advantages, wherein there is a fore-and-aft adjustment of each suspension to insure wheel alignment and to provide a suspension of this type wherein the torque beam and its attachment to the frame may have the foregoing features enabling this type of suspension to be mounted directly on the vehicle frame. A further object of the present invention is to design the foregoing parts so that they can be largely pre-assembled readily and then mounted onto the vehicle.
Thus, the objects of the present invention are to provide a suspension assembly of this type that can be used with drop frame vehicles and that is strong, that is easy to assemble, and yet that achieves the comfortable ride and the accommodation of the different movements of the axle relative to the frame.